Intolerable Company
by ExLibris3
Summary: Jen and Gibbs gets kidnapped. Managing to escape, they gets lost in the woods. How will they survive, when the one thing they really can't do is to get along? Jibbs.
1. Chapter 1

**Author's notes: I rewrote the first chapter to this one, it made it easier to continue.**

_A/N: A tale about surviving lost in the woods and with no food. And your only company is the one person you just can't get along with. But while on the run from villains, who knows what can happen in the woods at night…_

Gibbs groaned, his hand flew directly to his forehead, finding drops of perspiration covering his skin. Arrows shot though his head with the movement. _Aaargh, what the hell's happened to me?! Where am I? _He was starting to regain his senses and could feel his body was lying uncomfortably bent, when he inhaled, the air was thick, and a sticky smell went up his nose, making his stomach turn. _Have I been drugged? Damn it, what happened? _When he tried to open up his eyes, all he saw was black and white spots covering his sight. He shut his eyelids tightly, trying to clear his mind, trying to reach beyond the fog that was hiding his memory from him. Thinking back, he remembered the sound of shrieking tires, a woman, and blackness.

_**6 hours earlier.**_

_As Director Jenny Shepard exited the NCIS building to go home for the night, she heard someone calling her name from behind her. She pulled to a halt and waited patiently for Agent Gibbs to catch up with her._

"_What can I do for you at this hour, Special Agent Gibbs?" she asked politely while digging through her purse for her car keys. _

"_I wanted to talk to you about the case we had today," he said as soon as he reached her, panting slightly from having hurried after her._

"_Jethro, if this is about me getting involved in your cases…"_

"_It is…"_

"_Then we have nothing to talk about. I have the right to take part in any NCIS investigation that I want to," she explained in a stern voice, "Including yours, Special Agent Gibbs," she added, already knowing what he had been about to say. _

"_Jen!" he burst out in anger, glaring at her. Jenny merely ignored him as she continued to rummage through her purse in her hunt for her car keys. _

"_End of discussion, Agent Gibbs," she rose her head and met his ice cold gaze with her own equally chilly stare. She held her keys in a firm grip, throwing the purse back over her shoulder and made an attempt to head off toward her car._

"_Jen!" he repeated, watching her stop, and then, slowly, turning around to face him again._

"_What, Jethro?" she sounded annoyed, and he figured she'd rather be on her way home than argue with him in the parking garage at NCIS._

"_If I were Director, I'd probably be doing the same thing," he added in attempt to ease the tension between them. But he found her glaring right back at him, one hand on the purse resting over her shoulder, the other on her hip._

"_I'm sure you would," she replied, slight sarcasm in her voice as she turned to leave._

"_Damn it," Gibbs mumbled under his breath, watching her walk off toward her car. Her coat rippled behind her and the heels clinked loudly against the cement floor. _Why can't the damn woman be reasonable for once?_ He thought, still gazing at her figure as she began to disappear in the half-dark parking garage. He shook his head, knowing the fight would probably continue tomorrow, and turned to find his own car._

_Five minutes later, he sat behind the wheel, slowly driving through the nearly empty parking garage, it was late in the evening, not that many people where working now, mainly just the night shift and some security guards. He got frankly surprised upon seeing Jenny's car still there; he'd expected her to be long gone already. He got even more surprised, not to say shocked, when he noticed a figure lying in a crumpled heap beside the car. The headlights of his car lit up the scene in front of him, and his throat contracted unpleasantly as he recognized the red coat and short, auburn hair. Her purse had slid off her shoulder and was wrapped around her wrist. But it was still Jenny Shepard, lying there, knocked out and unconscious next to her car in the parking garage at NCIS._

_He hit the brakes, the tires shrieked and he was out of the car before it had even stopped properly. He didn't bother to shut the door, none of that seemed relevant at this moment. He was by her side faster than it took to blink an eye; he sank to his knees next to her slumped body._

"_Jen! Jen, are you ok? Can you hear me?" he called out in desperation, his fingers fumbled trying to find a pulse. He felt a weak, but steady, beating under the skin in her neck. He crouched at her side, attempting to roll her over onto her back._

"_Jen, co…" the dang when something metallic hit against the back of his head cut him off mid-sentence. He immediately sank down to the ground, limp like a rag doll. His body rested heavily on top of Jenny's, both unconscious, hit over the head by the man that now stood in the shadows by her car. Someone turned off the engine of Gibbs' car, it became completely silent._

_**End flashback**_

Her world was black. Airless. Paralyzed. She was lost in darkness, unable to move or breathe or see. Her reality was more hellish than she could have imagined. Jen tried to open her eyes, found they had been taped over. Her mouth was taped shut as well. Panic rustled through her body. Attempting to move her hands, she was hit with the realization they had been tied together across her chest. A burning sensation around her eyes suggested that if she could, she would have cried. _I can't breathe! _Her heart raced in panic. Her nostrils were free; she drew a deep breath through her nose, trying to piece together the fragments of memory that started to come to her.

_The parking garage. Gibbs. Unidentified shadow coming up behind her. _

She wriggled her fingers in attempt to reach the tape that bound her wrists. It wouldn't budge. She tried to move in her blindness, pain rippled like flames through her body. _Breathe, breathe…_ As the pain subsided, she tried to get the brain cells working. They reluctantly began to connect what was going on around her. She had to rely on hearing impressions and smell. A soft layer was covering her, she realized she was either stuffed in a bag or wrapped in a blanket. Her brain cells slowly came to, and they were screaming, _Get the hell out of here! _Another brain cell was debating the others, _How will I manage that? _

She tried to get her racing heart to slow down, its pounding echoed in her ears. She clenched her teeth to bite back a groan as her wrists burned when she tried to twist them free. She needed to determine her whereabouts. As her pulse slowly wound down, she focused her ears on the surrounding environment. The rustle of dead leaves. Wind winding through branches. Her nose caught the scent of moist soil. They were forest impressions. And she was possibly alone.

Gibbs' eyes fluttered open yet again, though it didn't matter if they were open or shut, it was still equally dark. _Where the hell am I? _With great caution, he stretched out his hands before him, feeling around, trying to determine his whereabouts. Next, a thought stuck him that made his mouth go dry and he felt an uncomfortable tremor below his tongue. _Jen! Damn it, where is she? _His thoughts were of desperate nature, and considering what condition she had been in the last time he had seen her, he had every right to be worried. He bit back a groan of pain as his searching fingers hit against something solid not far above his head. He was trapped. Possible locked in somewhere. _Damn. _He tried stretching out his legs that were stiffly bent; his foot hit a possible wall. He felt close to retching, until this point he'd been unaware of any injury he might have sustained, but as he moved, a knife might was well have been thrust into his back, and his head felt like it was on fire. His heart sank in his chest as he realized Jen was nowhere close, this space was too damn small, and he was there alone.

His body suddenly tensed. A sound broke the silence. The thump of a car door. This made the realization on his whereabouts hit him flatly in the face. The trunk of a car!

_No! Jen… I gotta find Jen…_ his mind screamed, his fingertips clawing feebly against the ceiling. _She's alive, damn it! She's somewhere near…Need to get out… Need to find her…_ he refused himself to think any negative thoughts.

_**To be continued…**_


	2. Chapter 2

_A/N: I'm terribly sorry for the lack of updates, but I had some trouble piecing together this chapter. I hope you'll like it and I hope to keep having you intrigued. Please review! Thanks xxx_

Tony ducked under the police tape marking off the area in the parking garage where they had found Gibbs' car abandoned in the middle of the lane. He pushed his hair back and adjusted his NCIS cap, a stern expression on his face. He approached McGee taking photos of Gibbs' car, the door had been left wide open when found. Tony was having a nagging feeling in his gut, something was very wrong with this picture. And it was not just that Gibbs' car had been left behind in the NCIS parking garage that bothered him at the moment, it was the lack of progress.

"Hey, people! A little less conversation, a little more action!" he barked at McGee, who had let down his camera to exchange a few words with Ziva. The Israeli looked his direction; a small crease wrinkled her forehead.

"Elvis?" she asked and raised her own camera to take a snap of the dirty shoeprints they'd found next to the car.

"No, I'm DiNozzo…." Tony replied sarcastically and then turned to McGee for an update while Ziva rolled her eyes. "Probie, what you got?"

"Uhm... we've taped off the lane and marked out tire tracks from Gibbs' car, and also from an unidentified vehicle," he pointed further up the lane where a set of tire tracks were marked by a number. "Whoever was driving must have raced toward the boss' car, they both hit the brakes, Gibbs is being forced out, and they must have taken him with them. When they drove off, they rounded his car and continued in that direction," McGee continued and pointed over his shoulder.

"Surveillance video?" Tony asked, arms crossed over his chest.

"I had Ziva pull the tapes," he replied and gestured to Ziva that she'd give them to Tony.

"Have one of the newbies run it up to Abby, tell her to check for any leads. Anything else, probie?" Tony ordered and after exchanging a look with McGee, Ziva walked off to send someone up with the surveillance tape.

"Well, we've got footprints," he pointed down, just outside the driver's door, at two dirty footprints leaving the car, supposedly in a hurry. "And the engine was off when the car was found, but the keys was still in," he added and Tony's eyes found the key still in the ignition.

"Keep working," he instructed and turned to leave.

"Tony," McGee's voice stopped him, he turned back to him when he continued to speak. "You don't think he's…" his voice broke, worry shone in his eyes. Tony once again felt the unpleasant turn of his gut.

"Don't be ridiculous, probie. It's the boss we're talking about, he'll be fine," he spoke with more confidence then he felt, but didn't want McGee's hope to fade. After all, hope was what made them go on, when the odds were against them.

"Tony!" Ziva's voice echoed through the parking garage. Both Tony and McGee looked up in the direction of her voice. Sending each other a glance, they hurried off toward her, McGee still holding on the camera. They ducked under the police tape marking off the scene and found Ziva on the ground next to another car.

"What you got?" Tony asked, pulling to a halt next to her in the crammed space between the cars. She pointed at the ground before her. He leaned down and placed his hands on his knees to get a better look at what she was showing. He straightened up just as McGee squeezed in next to him.

"Blood," he stated bitterly. "Whose car is this?"

Ziva glanced up at them from where she was crouching on the ground; her eyes were full of concern. "Director Shepard's,"

- - -

Madam Director was twisting in her cocoon, flashes of light burst through her head; she stopped moving and waited until the pain had subsided. Who had left her alone in this hellish nightmare? And why? While giving that some thought, but not coming up with a good enough answer, she began twisting her wrists again. The damned tape wouldn't budge. She moved her hips an inch, and instantly felt it where it was concealed at her waist. The knife!

Since she'd started working with Gibbs, he'd ranted on and off about his damned rules. Now most of the time she wasn't even aware of it, but she still clung onto some of these rules. And some had been broken. But that was a long time ago. One she always followed, on the other hand, was rule nine, never go anywhere without a knife. She did indeed enjoy the knowledge she was walking around with a knife concealed at her waist, it had impressed a certain Israeli too.

But could she reach it? It might just be her only change at breaking free. She slowly inched her hands toward her waistline. The tip of her nail scraped against the top of the knife handle, the tape and the fact that her shoulders felt like they had been smashed to pieces made her feel pretty much paralyzed.

But with the thought that a little pain just might be worth breaking free as motivation, she inched her hands around her hips. She bit down hard on her lip as it felt as though knife were thrust into her shoulder. She breathed out the breath she was not aware she had been holding as her fingertips caught hold of the top of the handle. She stopped there. Wriggled her fingers a little. The handle moved a millimeter. She clenched her teeth as her nails scraped, then lost the grip. She tried not to wince, but let her fingers once again inch closer toward the handle. She caught it again, wriggled it slightly. It stuck at her waistline, she gave it another wriggle, but did not dare to work it too hard in case she'd lose her grip again, and it would fall and land beside her where she couldn't reach it.

The sound of tires on gravel had her freezing in her movement. Closer and closer the sound came. An approaching car! _Damn it! _She felt ice-cold panic fill up her chest, but tried to ignore it as she inched the knife further up, until she had the handle securely in her hand.

_Okay, come on, Jenny. You can do this. Just place the knife between your hands like this…_ she thought while twisting the knife with the blade down and started to hastily cut through the tape. The knife was just a bit lazy and an icy hand gripped at her heart as she heard the engine of the car being turned off. She had no idea how close it was, just that it was parked in a close proximity, and she had no doubt it belong to her kidnappers. She may only have minutes before they would come to collect her.

Driven by that thought, she gave the knife one final, hard thrust, and the tape ripped apart. With pounding wrists her hands flew to her face, finger tips gripping around the edges of the tape blinding her. She ripped it off, and parts of her eyebrows too, she suspected as she tried not to wince as the skin around her eyes burned. Next, the tape covering her mouth, again, her skin was burning. She stopped to listen. Nothing. It worried her. And she wasn't worrying for nothing. It was too late to react when the sound of feet on gravel sounded way too close. It was too late to run when somebody knelt beside her. It was too late to scream when somebody placed a hand on the canvas covering her, pressing down hard over her mouth. It was too late for anything when somebody began to drag her down the gravel road.

_To be continued..._


End file.
